"The Engineer" by Twisted Zero
Greetings and Salutations to all. My name is Javian Verreaux, and before you say anything at all, let me remind you of the renowned Australian comedian Yahoo Serious, and let us not forget the prestigious Zappa family. I expect to hear no mention of any funny names for the duration of this story, and you may find it a bit too intriguing to be distracted from it anyway, if I do say so myself. I know it was rather enthralling as it happened, but that's neither here nor there. Well, it was here--Riverwind, that is--but it--or should I say "he"--is gone. But I get ahead of myself; and I wouldn't want to get off track.
Let us begin the story of....
The Engineer.
Riverwind was by no means a major metropolis, but also not a poor little podunk. No, just as a suburb of Velo City, Ohio, Riverwind was a moderate sized place to live. I lived in one of the decent neighborhoods, mainly because a poor one nary existed.
It was early Friday morning, about seven a.m.. My house is on a corner, and the bus stop is right there. As per usual, I came bolting out of my house, hiking my backpack up over my shoulders and half ran, half fell down the five porch steps and skidded to a halt ten feet in front of those steps at the sidewalk. Once again, I met the same six kids who waited at that very same stop, just as the bus was pulling up. One kid with super black hair that went all over the place looked at me and made an irritated face.
"Dude," he said, "You live--at--the bus stop. Can't you be out here on time like those of us who have to walk to get here?"
"Sorry," I said, for lack of anything else. The bus pulled to a stop and opened its doors with a hiss and we boarded.
The bus sides to school were more for mobility purposes than anything else. I was 16, in my sophomore year, but had no car. We had two vehicles, one for mom, a healthcare go-to-your-home kinda nurse, and one for dad, an electrician. I would walk home, weather permitting, but I always rode the bus in the morning, because it was either too cold or I was too tired. Or, a combination of the two.
Anyway, I was the last of our bus stop people to get on the bus. About half the seats were left open. I spied the seat that contained a kid with silver wire-rimmed glasses and a green jacket made of a very light, flimsy material, and plopped down in the seat with him. His name was Peter, and he was a very nice kid. He gave me a once over; the black cargo pants, the black long-sleeve shirt, the key lime green dress shirt, left undone, of course, and both the silver and the electric blue necklaces. Seriously, the blue one has a tiny button where it fastens in the back and the different sections will light up. It's neat. He also smirked at my spiked-up hair.
"I see we got ready in record time today, Jay," he said with sarcastic intentions, but he failed miserably. I mean, I didn't know the kid too well, but we got along O.K. and talked almost once a day. But he just seemed kinda... off.
"But of course," I replied. I then looked around the bus and took notice of just how quiet and...somber everybody was. "Hey dude," I said, "What's up? Everybody seems kinda dead this morning."
"Jay!" he gasped, but in a whispery, hoarse voice. Then, a second later, he slapped me upside the head.
"Ow! What?" I yelped, placing a hand on my head, like that would help to ease the sting.
"Dude, two people died last night!" he said, getting very quiet and talking thru his teeth.
"What?!" I asked, mimicking his tone.
"Oh--please--don't tell me you don't watch the news??" he asked. "There were two people who's car appearantly stopped dead on the train tracks, and they didn't get out in time."
"Oh, my god!" I exclaimed. "Do you know who they were?"
"Well, they said the names, but nobody I knew. I guess they were a couple of college kids home for the week. But nobody said why they were out there, or anything about what was actually going on. All anybody knows--well, officially--is that they were these two kids in their car, and now they're those two kids all over the tracks."
"Wow," I said, and faced the front of the bus, letting my back hit the seat. It was a very long shot that I'd know who they were, but it was still a shock, and especially gruesome, for lack of a better term.
"Yeah," he whispered, concurring with my declaration of awe. We just sat there the whole rest of the ride. At one point, I was contemplating on how he reacted to my ignorance of the situation, but he was right; I don't watch much television. I make a point to watch wrestling, 'cause it's damn entertaining, and I watch movies on the pay stations. If anything else, I have to plan it ahead, as I'm usually busy trying to make things blow up in my basement, which I'll tell you about later. In fact, that's what I was preparing for all of last night. I was online looking for parts from five-thiry to nine.
I was brought out of my sea of deep thought when the four-story Cemetary High came into view. I kid you not, that was the actual name of the place, and there's a reason why. One of the biggest grave yards in town is right across the street. Serious. And yes, there have been a BILLION stories about the school being haunted, but everyone disregards them and they're really just used to scare the shit out of the freshmen. It's great. Anyway, we got to school and everyone went to their first period classes, then second, and so on. In lew of the previus night's tragedy, there were no actual classes that day, which is understandable, and most would definitely call it a good thing. At lunch, it was about half as noisy as usual, but that's because nobody was too light-hearted. I sat at my "gang's" usual table, and, as always I was the first one there. They filled in, and took their normal seats; Becky, who was one of the prettiest girls in school but who also refused to accept it (God knows why) was first, followed a minute behind by Jason "Bluestreak" Riley, so nicknamed for a couple of reasons: One, he was on the track team, and was probably the fastest son of a gun you've ever seen. Two, because his eyes were so damn...bright and blue that if it was the first time you'd seen him, they'd mesmerize you. And, lastly, calling him "Bluestreak" broke the confusion when someone was coming up to both of us and said "Hey, Jay,". Next came Tin Tyran. His name was Quentin, and if there was ever a guy who's initials were meant to be Q.T., lemme tell ya, it was him. But "Quentin" just seemed a little too much for him, so he always preferred we call him "Tin", as "Quen" was too easy for people to try to make fun of. A few minutes after Tin sat down, Derrick Darkell sat down with his significant other, Sheila Breaker. They were nice before they hooked up, but since they've been together it kinda gags everybody to be around them for more than five minutes. Neverthelss, this was my posse.
"Awful thing that happened," said Derrick, opening the Pepsi he got from the vending machine.
"I agree," said Tin, before biting his sandwich.
"Good," said Derrick, putting down his can. "In fact, I'll bet we're all feeling very symathetic for all parties involved or in any way connected with said event, and seeing as how that's about all anyone of us can do, I think we'd best be on to bigger and better subjects of conversation."
I admit, Derrick can be very to-the-point, and I was a little surprised myself that he would flat out say he was tired of hearing about people that had no effect on him, dead or alive, but I could also understand where he was coming from, though harsh it may sound.
"I do have one question about it, though, if I may present it," stated Bluestreak, while examining his yellow-green apple.
"Just one?" asked Derrick, and when Bluestreak nodded, he waved a hand at him to indicate he could begin.
"My question is this; why did the train not stop when it hit the car?"
He took a big bite from his apple, and as nobody had thought about that yet and were all in deep thought, he had a moment to think again, and stated, "Also, I don't know about any of you, but I saw the few video clips they had of the scene on the news last night, and now that I think about it, I don't recall seeing any metal."
This prompted a lost look from everyone present.
"What?" asked Tin.
"I mean, none of the paint was scraped off--well, at least not that I could see."
"So the guy overdoes it with the Armorall, let it go." said Derrick. "New topic, someone."
"Y'know, I could never be a Smurf," Tin said rather thoughtfully, and he began to elaborate on exactly why this was. I, however, faded off into a world of my own, mulling over the two points that Bluestreak had brought up and trying to come up with some sort of conclusion for them, but failing to do so at every turn.
I decided, as I overheard Tin saying something about how he couldn't deal with shoes and pants being merged into one garment, to drop the whole thing. It wasn't my problem, so I wasn't going to treat it as if it were. The lunch bell rang, and the rest of our classes went on as drudgingly and hollow as the rest.
At the end of the day, Derrick drove home with Sheila, as always. They were going out on their own tonight for some queasy kind of anniversary, or something. Bluestreak took his bus home and said something about staying in tonight, but I don't know what for. Becky drove herself home and had some hot date. Tin disappeared before I knew what he was doing, but he usually did. His locker was all the way down the corridor and right near the doors to the parking lot anyway. Alone again on a Friday after school, I made sure I left all the useless and/or educational junk in my locker and made my way casually down the hallway through the malevolent onslaught that was tearing their way to their two-day freedom. I got to the doors and halted, looking up at the sky and taking in the feeling of true happiness that was a temporary lull in my education. There was a slight breeze, and I could have watched the scenery for quite some time, but too many people were blasting past me, so I went with the flow.
I meandered across the parking lot, paying no mind to the frantic people and vehicles that scattered and cluttered the pavement. A tune entered my head as I started strolling down the sidewalk, and after a few minutes, there were random words popping into my head. I started stepping to the rhythm of the music in my brain which was by now a five-part song. I wasn't dancing, mind you, but I had an obvious spring to my step, and a rhythm as well. In fact, I was totally engulfed in my musical discovery when a car pulled up beside me.
"Hey, bud," said Tin. I stopped dead and looked right at him.
"Hey," I said. "What're you doin' here? I thought you left way before I did."
"Yeah, well, I did. I just felt kinda...lonely." he stated. "I heard everybody else had plans for the night, and I was wonderin' if you wanted to go out...like, see a movie, or something?"
"What movie?" I asked, starting to bob side to side again.
"'The Mist' is supposed to be pretty scarey," he suggested.
"That the one about the chainsaw murderer made outta acid?" I asked. I don't keep too up on my movies.
"Yeah, somehting like that," he said, rubbing the back of his neck and squinting a little, as the sun was starting to hit his eyes.
"Cool," I said. "Death by acid man is my kinda entertainment."
"Cool. I'll come getcha 'round seven," he said, then took off.
I kinda wondered to myself for a moment if Tin knew he'd just made a date with me, or if he thought I knew it was a date, or if he even knew I was gay, but then the song came back into full swing, and I bopped the rest of the way home, the little encounter forgotten for now.
"Spinnin' through the lightspeed, universe nucleus, "Bankin' off the edges of a place that isn't there, "Shootin' through the warp zone, fightin' with the vortex, "Open up a gateway to the back of Everywhere."
It was this collection of nonsense that I was singing when I opened the door to my house and dropped my bad by the doorway. I saw the mail on the counter and shimmeyed over to it to see what there was; nothing. Well, bills and a magazine for my Mom on how to wish you could afford to have your kitchen remodeled, but that's it. I dropped the mail onto the same place I'd picked it up from, and opened the fridge to pull out a Pepsi. I opened it with my teeth (which is simply habit now, one which I'll explain at a later date) and made my way upstairs to my room, kicking off my shoes in the process of leaving the kitchen. Normally, such slovenly behavior would receive serious repercussions, but on Fridays my mom works from 3 to 11, and my dad goes to the Silver Trolley with his work buddies for a few hours. (By the way, I really hate the Silver Trolley, because it's actually a dark brown bar, and in no way a silver trolley at all.) I climbed the stairs and nudged open my bedroom door, which was left slightly ajar from the morning. I took a swig from my Pepsi and set it down on my desk before letting my body drop heavily onto my bed. I stared at the ceiling for a while.
The music wasn't leaving my head, so I got up and took my Pepsi down to my basement. I say "my" basement, because my folks have declared it that. That is where I do all of my "work", making and unmaking a million electronic things a week. About a year ago, I put together my own synthesizer and, if I do say so myself, it kicks ass. True, I didn't really "make" the different sounds it produces, but I did download them and organize which keys make which frequencies, so I put an honest enough effort into that. I also kinda have it hooked up to my computer down there (the functioning one) so I can record everything I play on it to a MIDI program that I modified to write what I play, because I couldn't find or afford any that did that. It wasn't hard, but it took some time. Anyway, I took a few minutes and wrote out the music that was in my head. It was awesome, if I do say so myself. I played it back a few times after it was saved and basked in my creativity.
After the third hearing, I looked at my watch and saw it was nearing six o'clock, and I knew my dad would be home soon. I shut off all my junk and went upstairs. I grabbed my shoes and my bag and went up to my room to drop them inside. I heard a car pull up and stop then shut off the engine and finally the door opened and closed. I looked out my window which overlooked the street and saw a very dark world. The sun was already past the horizon, the Eastern sky already black. I saw a dark car sitting in front of our house and a silhouette of Tin heading to my door. I bolted down the stairs and slid into the kitchen, yanking the door open just before he could grab the knob. With the priceless look on his face, I got the feeling I kinda scared him.
"You're early," I said, steping back to let him in.
"True," he stated simply, walking past me and shutting the door. "I got bored. I figured if you were up to it we could get somethin' to eat before the movie. Just McDonald's, or something."
"Sounds good to me," I said, grabbing a marker and the writing pad kept on the counter by the fridge. On the pad a scribbled a mostly legible note telling my parents that I'd gone with Tin to go see a movie. "Let's roll," I said, and with that, we were out the door.
We were in the car driving down the expressway to head into Velo. I subconciously knew what I was doing, but my concious mind wasn't doing a very good job at nagging. I was watching Tin. Tin was the kind of kid who was pretty enough to be popular and an all-around jackass, but he wasn't like that. In fact, I don't know if he knew how good looking he was, but plenty of girls had asked him out. He just never accepted, unless it was a "my friends and I are going to this thing, do you wanna come too?" kinda situations. Ever since I met him I thought he was cute as hell, but I always just thought he was a straighty, so any ideas of a relationship with him were immediately tossed out the window. And as far as I knew, nobody knew I was gay, because I know for a fact I'm not a fireball, and I don't strain my neck looking at the boys. But I also had a lovely peice of eye candy right beside me, and the way the street lights reflected off the hood and into his car gave him a very dim, almost unnoticable glow; but then the oncoming cars lit him up in wavesIt was just interesting to see something as beautiful as his face appear to fade in and out of existence. I saw the corner of his mouth try not to turn up, after about twenty minutes, and he quickly looked over at me, back to the road, then me again.
"What?" he said through a nervous laugh, then looked once more to the road. At this point, my concious brain gave me a big ol' "SEE??" and my subcon was all like "I didn't do anything," so my mouth was left to fend for itself.
"'What'? Um...uh, nothin'. Just kinda...spaced out for a minute there."
I never have been good at lying.
"Oh. O.K.," he said in a slightly dejected manor, and switched on his radio. He had a Zoobombs CD in and it started playing "Mo' Funky (Pt. 1)". I was kinda thankful for the extra noise, but why he had a CD from a Japanese rock band who got their name from a common American mispronunciation of the Japanese word "zubon" which means "trousers", I don't think I'll ever understand. We got to the Silver Park Mall, a monstrosity I might add, and parked near the middle of its enormously huge parking lot.
We trekked our way into the mall, and found ourselves in the gigantic food court. The place was packed, and it took some time to get the the little McDonald's that was nearly straight across from where we came in, but we managed. We sat across from each other eating our double quarter pounders, and I had a rough time trying to explain the only rational reason I could think of as to why exactly it is that they don't just call them "half pounders".
At six forty-five, we left the food court and walked for about ten minutes to get to the theater in the mall. There wasn't much of a line, but the place was pretty full. We took our seats near the aisle and about third row from the back. I will say, 'The Mist' was a very kickass movie. It's about this psycho chainsaw killer guy, but nobody knows who he is, so the "official" name for this guy is 'Chainsaw Charlie'. He tries to chop up these scientist guys in a lab, and he hits a tank full of this crazy acid stuff that bonds with whatever it breaks down and makes his molecules into ions. His aura holds his peices together, and Charlie becomes, literally, a human fog. It was really crazy.
We left the theater, and as such, the mall, and walked out into the parking lot. We made our comments on what we thought of the movie, but nothing major. We got to his car and he put his arms on the roof and leaned against the car.
"Jay," he said, looking me right in the eye.
"Yeah?" I choked. This was weird. We should be going.
"I don't wanna go home," he finished. I couldn't tell you, because I don't know myself, just how many thoughts went blasting through my brain when Mr. Cuteboy said that.
"W--um..." I started, very unsure of everything all of a sudden. I shifted my weight and blinked a couple times. "Where do you, uh...wanna go?" Smooth, huh? He didn't seem to notice how nervous I'd just gotten. Instead, it appeared that he was struck with a very contemplative idea.
"Do you have a curfew?" he asked.
"No," I said, carefully making myself sound fine. "They know I'm with a trustworthy person."
He smiled. "Cool," he said. "I wanna show you something."
"K," was all I could iterate, and we got in his car. In about fifteen minutes, we were back in Riverwind, but out near the hills. He pulled over on about the seventh hill we got to and shut off the car.
"We're here," he said, a smile on his face. He unbuckled his seat belt and exited the vehicled, me following suit. There was about eight feet between the edge of the road and the peak of the hill. He walked toward it and sat down, as did I. I looked out and saw what it was that he'd wanted to show me: Riverwind. Well, the lights of Riverwind's nightside. In the distance was Velo City, all lit up and shimmering with the essence of a thousand stars.
"Wow," I whispered, mostly to myself.
"It's neat, isn't it?" he asked with a smile.
"Very," I said, still quietly. "How did you discover this veiw?"
"I was out with my brother a couple years ago. We got a flat right here at about one in the morning, on our way home. I saw it that night and I've been coming back here ever since. Something about it just sorta..." He slightly shook a fist in front of him to help him think of how to describe it. "...I dunno...hit me. Stole part of my soul, or something, because everytime I'm here, it...feels like there's something I'm supposed to find."
I looked over at him, both of us now lying back, our elbows supporting us. Seeing him in nothing but moonlight, I'd almost lost control of myself.
"Do you think you'll find whatever it is you're looking for?" I asked. He leaned closer.
"I think I already have," he said, and with that, he kissed me. There is no way to describe a first kiss. It simply cannot be done. He broke away and after my brain landed back in my head, I opened my eyes.
"How did you know?" I asked, rather sheepishly, I might add.
"Well, I could tell you were my kinda guy from the get go," he said with a smile. "Just look at how ya dress."
"What? I keep up with the style," I defended.
"That's what I said," he chuckled. I shoved his shoulder and he fell onto his back, still giggling.
"You know somethin, Quentin?" I asked in mock irritation. He flinched at his name and lifted his head to look at me.
"What?" he asked. I put a hand on either side of his shoulders and positioned my face right above his, my arms holding my body up.
"I don't wanna go home," I said, and the events that followed were longer and more in-depth versions of the first physical encounter of the evening.
After we made out for about two hours, we decided to finally go home, but to Tin's house, so I could spend the night. We took one last look at the night side of Riverwind, and got in the car. Over and around the hills to the outskirts of town, heading back toward its center. Now there is one little thing about the systems of Riverwind that I neglected to mention. Riverwind is a major train town. The amount of train tracks in this town is about equal to half the amount of roads. On the way back into town, we stopped at the only railroad crossing that we'd passed on the way in, as the lights were blinking, the bell was dinging and the bars were down.
There were trees all around, and the lights gave them an erie, throbbing glow. Tin had stopped his car about ten feet from the tracks. We waited about fifteen seconds, and finally I was getting ancy.
"Where's the damn train?" I asked impatiently.
"I dunno," he answered, leaning over the wheel, trying to see down the tracks.
At this point, there was a sudden jerk of the car, and it started slowly creeping toward the rails.
"Whoa," he yelped, and, just as startled as he, I then asked, "What was that?"
"Shit," he said, lifting his foot then hastily slamming it back down on the brake. This is when we heard the first whistle blow.
"Fuck! Why are we moving?!" I yelled, becoming scared.
"I don't know--hold on!"
With that, Tin took his foot off the brake and the car started heading to the rails at a very quick pace. As the train came into veiw, he damn near jumped on the brake pedal and slammed the transmission into reverse. The train was fifty yards away and gaining speed when Tin gunned the engine. The train was very, very big--and long; there were at least 20, maybe 30 cars behind the single engine. The bars began to raise, and although the tires were squealing and burning out in reverse, the car was still slowly, very slowly, sliding its way toward the tracks. The bars were totally vertical, the lights and bell doing double-time; the train was like exploding thunder, it was so loud. The car was about a foot away from the tracks when the engine was directly in front of us, neither of us capable of rational thought; all we could do was scream and hold on.
Ah, cliffhangers. I love 'em. >:) If this was intriguing enough, then the next edition will be in shortly. Hope you like what you get, guys.
--Twisted Zero (TwistedZero@thevortex.com)